Demos disrupt Strasbourg visit by Nato leaders'spouses

Anti-Nato protesters set fire to a barricade on the Europe Bridge in Strasbourg, eastern France yesterday to protest against the Nato summit. Small mobile groups of protesters played cat and mouse with battalions of French riot police, seeking to cause maximum disruption on the final day of the Nato summit in Strasbourg. Photo: AFP

Demonstrations in Strasbourg, where leaders of the member states of Nato are celebrating its 60th anniversary, disrupted a programme laid on for their spouses yesterday.
A planned visit to a cancer research centre in the morning was called off and replaced by a brief meeting at a museum as hardcore groups of protesters clashed with riot police for a second day.
Around 10,000 police were deployed in buses around the city which looked like a ghost town. In the city centre the only traffic was the occasional bicycle. Cafe owners had been told to close down. Locals and reporters covering the meeting had to undergo identity checks.
The wives, plus German Chancellor Angela Merkel's husband, Joachim Sauer, met at a museum, which had once been a prince's home, where the red carpet laid for the visit Friday by US and French Presidents Barack Obama and Nicolas Sarkozy was still in place.French first lady, a smiling Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, wearing black trousers with a mauve coat and matching handbag welcomed the spouses on the steps of the building.
A security glitch meant that three wives arrived before the 11:00 am (1000 GMT) time scheduled for the reception.